Ravi came home stamping his feet. Moti the puppy trotted behind him, ears flat, as if he too had had a bad afternoon.

"What happened?" asked Nani, setting down her bamboo pen.

"Everything!" said Ravi. "I wanted Arun's new kite so badly I couldn't think about anything else. Then when he wouldn't let me hold it, I got so angry I shouted. And then — " he went a little quiet — "when he wasn't looking, I almost grabbed it and ran. I almost took it, Nani."

Nani did not scold. She nodded slowly, the way she did when she understood something completely. She dipped her finger in red paint and drew three small doorways on a scrap of bark.

"Sit," she said. "I want to show you something the old teachers knew. Trouble almost never barges straight into a person. It comes in through one of three gates. And you, my clever boy, walked through all three this afternoon."

She touched the first door. "This first gate is called kama — wanting-too-much. Not just liking the kite. Wanting it so much that nothing else mattered. That is the gate that opened first."

She touched the second. "The wanting could not get in by itself, so it called its friend. This second gate is krodha — anger. When you could not have what you wanted, the wanting turned hot and you shouted."

She touched the third. "And then the worst friend arrived. This third gate is lobha — greed. Greed whispered, 'Just take it. Grab it and run.' You almost listened."

Ravi stared at the three little red doors. "They're all connected," he said slowly.

"They are," said Nani. "Wanting-too-much, anger, and greed. Three gates into a dark room. But here is the good news, Ravi — they are gates, not walls. A gate can be closed. You do not have to become a different person or fight a thousand bad habits. You only have to learn to shut these three. Close them, and the darkness has no way in."

Ravi looked at his hands — the hands that had almost grabbed the kite. "I can close a gate," he said. "I can do that."

Nani smiled and pressed the little painted bark into his palm. "Then you already know more than many grown men. Keep this. Three gates. Learn their names, and you will see them coming."